Let Me Tell You About My People {on Being Thankful}

This time last year the world was shaky. The church we were going to and had been going to for about 15 years had entered into a huge crisis because of a decision that was made. As a result of that decision, fractures began to appear. Imagine driving a huge stone into a mostly frozen pond, a gaping hole where the rock went through and cracks and broken places extending out like spider webs. The rock, in this example, is the decision. The cracks and broken places are the relationships that were beginning to crumble around me.

It's been a hard year of recovery. When your world is completely changed and turned upside down, there are a lot of adjustments to be made. When people you thought you knew, don't turn out to be quite the way they portray themselves or you watch your friends being hurt by those who should be loving them, it flips all sorts of switches in your brain. Last January, February, March and April were intense. The most difficult months emotionally that I have ever had in life. I don't even know what to compare it to other that what it feels like to get out of an abusive relationship and finally claim the clarity you need to see all the wrong you have been dealing with for far too long.

I remember clearly back in January, I felt like I was standing in one place and watching all of my people walk away into different directions. I felt helpless, like my world was falling apart.

Community, especially my church community, was a huge part of my life and now we were being told "If people leave, let them go" or "don't you expect that if they choose to leave, they know their relationships with you will be different?".

No. No. No. No. I knew that was wrong and not the Jesus I knew. I knew that as I was watching people go, I could not give up on them. That just wasn't going to happen. I just can't reconcile that with Jesus.

So I started with dinner. Once a month a girlfriend or two or three or four would get together and digest; food and emotions. We had to purpose ourselves to be steady. To choose intentional relationships and shut out what we were being told. We had to choose one another in love over the turmoil around us. Some dinners were harder than others, we were all on the same path, just at different places but were were all extremely fragile. We laid the foundations of truth telling and open air conversations where you didn't have to put on a fake Jesus smile and pretend to be ok.

We shared raw emotions and hurts and struggles and emptied out the depths of our hearts. There were tears, a LOT of tears and we counted them dear. Not knowing what the future held, we chose one another. We have grieved deep loss together. We have been angry and hurt and weak and completely undone together and all the while God was working.

And we kept on choosing one another. Slowly over time we crossed over. From "yes, we are friends" to we are family forever. We have walked through the fire with one another and that fire has melded us together. We are welded onto one another's hearts by Jesus himself.

Where wrong and legalistic thinking tried to drive us apart, God himself stitched us together.

These are the kind of friendships you look for your whole life. These women are my own personal super heroes. This group of women, these faces and hearts are so very dear to me. I hold them tightly. There is no pretense. There are no games. No filters are required. No standards of conduct, in fact. We are honest and real and open. We share all of our thoughts and hopes no matter their condition. We rejoice together and still count tears when we need to. They are the best, most authentic relationships I have ever had outside of my own husband and a tiny handful of friends before.

Our recovery is still unsteady at times but together we have built an entirely firm foundation to work from. Where we were told that community had become an idol, we have proved that God has used our community for healing, for hope and joy, for experiencing Jesus himself.

For it is in the fertile ground of real friendships that Christ can grow and flourish within us. When one is hurting the rest of us rally, helping to brush away the debris and junk from the tiny flame and slowly encouraging the fire within us to roar. Instead of walking solo with our tiny flickers, we come together and have a huge bonfire. We fan the flames of Jesus in one another.

Where a decision once scattered us to the wind, God has used that time to link us together eternally.

If you find yourself as I was last January, purpose yourself to be purposeful. This group of women I described above did not happen on accident. They are a result of looking around in the midst of my despair and choosing to be purposeful in my pursuit of community, following my heart and not my given instructions. Had I looked around and done nothing, nothing would have happened.

If you can do nothing else and all of your energy reserves are being used on survival...rally the strength to reach out to one, on purpose, and keep doing it. Strength will grow there.

Though this past year has been downright hellish, these ladies have made it all worthwhile. Proving once again that from the ashes, God will do amazing things.

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